In The Wind
by Full Shadow Alchemist
Summary: Soulmates tend to meet in the oddest ways in the walls.


Fluttering in the wind, an invisible shadow crosses over the babe's face, this is Mikasa's earliest memory. She gurgled joyously, and reached pudgy fingers up towards it. Misjudging the distance, they fall short and away. The sun blinds her. She flinches. She whimpers. The thread crosses her vision again, and inexplicable joy fills her again. She continues to try and catch it. She tries for a long time and never gets bored. Until the breeze settles, and it falls down on top of her. It loops around and around on top of the blankets, then over her crib and out of sight.

Finally! She grabs it up into her hands greedily, and tries to put it into her mouth. It is a thing of no substance. She feels no line crease into her lip, no resistance against her gums, but it does not convince her that it isn't real.

She conducts her first experiments. She holds it in both hands and in one, tugs and pulls, hits it against the bed. She tries holding it with her feet, and finds it much harder to do than with her hands. She learns that when she drops it, it floats and lands on her chest or face. She giggles as it fits under her nose.

She throws it.

Transfixed, she watches it float and land by her little feet. Mikasa tries to pick it up again, but she lacks the upper body strength to sit up, and the coordination to do it with her feet. She gurgles again, except in confusion. Then she whimpers. Then she lets out a pathetic sob, and is ready to start bawling when she sees, her hands rolled into tiny balls, the thread wrapped around her little finger.

Giggling delightfully, she brings her head closer for inspection. It is wonderful. The red stands out against her skin nicely. It is pretty. She blows bubbles with her spit. She lets out a loud laugh.

A woman, her mother, appears over her and coos. She holds up a hand to show her beautiful thread. Her mother holds her hand. She reaches down and around Mikasa, cradling her lovingly. She is carried to the kitchen for supper. Facing backwards, she looks over her mother's shoulder.

Mikasa laughs and reaches out. The red string flutters in the wind, trailing out the window, and into a matching red sunset.

"It's your heart, darling," that's what her mother says.

Mikasa is named for her grandmother, she learns. Lost during the plague, her grandfather too. Her mother was destitute, and with nothing but her heart to lead her, she followed the string to her father. Her father had had dreams that made him toss in the night, so she knew her the second he laid eyes on her. If she had been afraid of being turned away, then she had learned there was nothing to fear as he swept her into his arms. Life had been hard, and her father had planned on joining the military. He had changed his mind, and sought other ways to support his new wife. It culminated in a farmer's life in Wall Maria.

They promise that once she grows up, they'll take her to follow the red thread.

The young child Mikasa smiles.

She looks forward to meeting her heart.

The world is cruel she learns.

This is what she sees in the boy's eyes, what she hears in her saviour's voice. This is what she saw in her father's crumpled figure, in her mother's red blood.

She holds the knife tighter.

As a baby, as a child, Mikasa had seen her future in the red thread attached to her little finger. She follows another string now, woven together with many others, knotted around her neck. Coiled there by a boy with red in his eyes.

If Eren didn't want to join the Scouting Legion, she might have planned on going on a journey. Like her mother. But she must keep him safe.

As Wall Maria falls, she is carried by Hannes under his arm to safety. As the man turns a corner, she sees her thread fluttering in the wind. Then it disappears from sight, and that is the last she thinks of it for a long time.

Joining the Scouting Legion, Mikasa still sees less of Eren than she would like. She puts up with it though, because she sees more of him like this than if she had followed any other path.

After class most days, training on a few, Mikasa goes out of her way to do more work for her superiors. Sometimes it means she can see Eren in passing. Most of the time, it doesn't. She tries anyway. It's one of the only things that helps calm her nerves, even when Armin's reassurances do nothing for her anymore.

It's a Thursday, and Dita Ness had just dismissed them for free time until dinner. Mikasa presents herself, and the man no longer asks if she needs or wants something. He smiles like it's a joke, and says, "You know Ackerman, if we keep working you into a frenzy like this, you won't have any strength left to go on the expedition!"

"It's fine", she says. "Rather than seeing it as a burden, I think of it as a chance to build my strength, even if only a little." Not a total lie, it's what she tells herself on unsuccessful days. Days where she couldn't follow where the red scarf leads her.

"Just for the record," Dita Ness says, "trying to cosy up with your superiors might be a smart tactic in the Military Police, but with us, the only way to move up is to prove yourself in the field." It was as friendly a warning could be.

She counters, "Preparing beforehand is half the battle. Having the strength to keep moving forward makes up most of the rest. That is what I believe."

"Doing the other recruits' laundry is what you believe in, eh?" He grins. "All right, all right. Check in with Nanaba, she almost always has something or other to be done."

Mikasa nods and salutes for good measure, while Dita Ness just waves her off. Nanaba did not have regular contact with Eren, but she was sometimes in the vicinity. Working with Eren was reserved exclusively for the Special Operations Squad and Major Hanji Zoe, neither of whom she had the authority to approach for no reason. Armin said they always got to see him at dinner so it wasn't all bad, but that isn't enough. Eren can regenerate a leg in an hour. If he is hurt, she'll never know before dinner, if at all.

She heads in the opposite direction of the others, which only Armin notices. She searches the usual spots, and finds Nanaba in the laundry room. She is in the middle of ironing some sheets that must be the corporal's, no one else would require this or waste resources like that. Nanaba greets her without surprise and wastes no time in directing her back outside to help the rest of them team take the sheets in. Mikasa nods.

She heads back outside, following a different path from the last one. She is alert, but encounters no one along the way. No sign of Eren.

She knew they kept him in the dungeons at night, but not where he went during the day. When she questioned him at the dinner table, he would say 'assisting with the experiments' (what experiments? Are they on you? What do they make you do?) or 'training' (with the 3DMG? With the Squad? Are they treating you fairly? _Is the corporal there-_). She doesn't know what they entail. She doesn't even know if he had been ordered to keep quiet about his day activities, or if he was choosing to exercise caution, or if he was just avoiding her questions altogether. The new recruits were monitored at all times, even if it never truly felt like it. There were also parts of the old headquarters that they were discreetly kept away from. Was that where Eren was? Is this all because of Eren, or was the Scouting Legion always this paranoid?

Mikasa doesn't know.

She found Nanaba's squad among the fluttering white sheets. They greet her without surprise as well. She is directed toward the far end, and told to work her way across. This she does with a nod of assent.

If she kept thinking like this, Mikasa would be crushed by the gravity of the matter, so instead she focused completely on the task at hand. This is how she became as talented as she was in training. Eren was often overcome by emotion, and Armin simply lacked the physical strength. Mikasa thought of the technique and what she needed to do, and her body quickly learned to obey. This applied to everything, from 3DMG to folding laundry perfectly. She might have liked to ask Corporal Levi about his techniques for learning in the past, but now…

Ah, she'd distracted herself again.

It never did any good to think about that midget. In the past she had respected him, if not admired. She may have seen him as a role model once. She had heard rumours of how protective he was of his subordinates. She had liked to think that he might understand why she wanted to protect Eren, as he must know the pain of losing friends. Those hopes and that respect flew out the window as Eren's tooth had flown across the court room. If that was how he treated his subordinates, if that was how Eren would live from now on, maybe trying to escape at Trost would have been better.

It's a useless thought, she knows. Of the little she's seen of the corporal around headquarters, he has been nothing short of respectable, if not on the cross side of things. Running away would have been full of endless problems. Here, at least, Eren was safe.

She catches sight of red in the corner of her vision. The string attached to her has not wavered in all the years she has neglected it. In a rare moment, Mikasa thinks about her heart. She still has that small part that wants to go off and find the other end of the string. It's a small part. She has a duty, and several red threads in a scarf coiled by a small, ruthless boy. If the fairytale ending they work for comes true, and if the string was still there, then she would follow it. Until then.

Mikasa turns away as she feels a gentle tug.

That has never happened before. She shouldn't be able to feel it.

Suddenly feeling like she was chocking on her own throat, Mikasa turns back. And stares.

The white sheets were flapping from the sudden wind, and her little red string is not. It is pulled almost completely taut. Cautiously, she inches forward a little.

A surge of wind from behind makes the sheets flare up, up almost horizontally to the ground. Mikasa sees him clearly then, in the next row of flying sheets. He is unfamiliar to her, but she knows him as Mike Zackarias. She watches him. She watches his eyes stay barely open, and how he takes a deep breath in.

The breeze dies, and the sheets settle down. Mikasa realises she's been holding her breath.

She counts two heartbeats, and then the captain is parting the sheets and sees her. He steps through properly. Her eyes drop to his feet, then she thinks about how that must look, so she looks up again. She feels her heart give one definitive thump, and her body tense as she recognizes the same hesitation in him.

Finding your soulmate was always described as a wonderful experience, full of joy and awe as the two ran into each other's arms. Aside from finding the image odd, Mikasa had felt a certain amount of fear. Is she had the setting wrong, if she acted with more trepidation or caution than enthusiasm, would she still be considered a worthy soulmate? Mikasa does not have the time to, or the heart to agree. Not to mention _Bonding_…

Her consolation right now is that Captain Zackarias is just as hesitant. He looks like he's about to speak. Mikasa almost snaps into an automatic salute. He says, "You were present at Eren's trial, were you not?"

Her heart drops. "Yes sir. I'm his," she tries to find the best words, "sister." Childhood friend could be disputed, and sounded rather desperate. Legally, they were family, an nothing could come between that. She accepted other people as her friends too now, anyway. Discreetly, she drops her eyes to his hand.

Her thread was tied to his pinkie. There was no mistake, he was the other half of her heart. Did he only come here because of her connection to Eren? Her heart, which had dropped, turns to lead. This was a good thing though, the pressure to confront her soulmate was gone. But so was her opening to ever talk to him again. The thought is sobering. The world is always revealing new layers of cruelty.

The Captain is much closer than he was a second ago. Mikasa would have started if her self-control was any less. As it was, she resists closing her eyes and shivering as Mike smells her. Ah, she is getting weak already, referring to her superior by his first name…

Finally, he steps back. Mikasa finally feels that she could breathe. The tension is still tight, but his stance was less rigid, more gentle. Without her consent, she follows suit and relaxes her shoulders.

"Do you have dreams?" he asks. She meets his eyes and stares uncomprehending. It hits her like a flash when she understands and she answers quickly:

"No, sir."

"Is it a song, then?"

No, she shakes her head. Before he can try again, she explains.

"My people have always been unique, in this aspect. Invisible to all eyes but our own, a red string is attached to our pinkies and our soul mate's. It's the closest to a tattoo that any of the Signs get." She swallows, and thinks of Eren for a moment. "Unlike those with tattoos, it is more an unwavering loyalty than outspoken passion. I've heard his might be because it's invisible, but I'm not sure."

He didn't speak for a moment, taking it in. he returns the favour. "To know your partner's smell of all things is very rare anymore. Certianly, I've had to check everyone I've ever met. They say it only goes to the most persistent, but my mother said it went to the nosiest. I can detect the smell of other soul mates as well." He pauses. "Of course, it's also the easiest to ignore. I can easily ignore their smell and their soul mate's in dire circumstances."

It was a warning, but one that didn't need saying. Mikasa is just glad that she isn't the one who needs to say it. "My string has been an oddity I haven't thought seriously about since I was a child. I can go a bit longer without as well." Her reassurances are almost desperate. She would never want to burden her heart, even if it meant burning it instead.

He raises an eyebrow. A question. "I should like to get to know you better."

Mikasa doesn't know where to go with this. She doesn't know if they have a future in this cruel world, or even if their schedules could coordinate and allow them to speak again like this. Another breeze picks up. The sheets around them billow, and she watches the thread flutter in the wind. Her mind has been made up long ago.

Mutely, shyly, she nods.


End file.
